


If you love me, leave me the hell alone

by Burbleburb



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: M/M, implied alcoholism, just generally a lot of sad stuff lol, sfw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-01
Updated: 2017-05-01
Packaged: 2018-10-26 02:44:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10777836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burbleburb/pseuds/Burbleburb
Summary: The remnants of monster kind has evacuated the underground after narrowly escaping a genocide run. After a few years of uneasy peace on the surface, Grillby decides to return to Mt Ebott to find out what happened to an old flame.





	If you love me, leave me the hell alone

**Author's Note:**

> I took some liberties with this so it doesn't 100% match the game lore, but I hope you enjoy anyways. The Grillby/Sans in this is mostly just implied, so on the shipping front it's pretty tame!

It had been several years since the monsters had pushed their way past the barrier and thrown themselves at the mercy of the humans. There was an uneasy peace between the two species; the monsters had given up a lot in order to secure their safety, but the death of king Asgore and the missing queen had put many humans at ease. Leaderless and fleeing for their lives, the monsters seemed a great deal weaker than they had during the war, and many of the humans who had originally sealed them underground had passed on. The upside to the fleeting lifespan of a human was that public opinion changed relatively fast.

Still, Grillby found it hard to get too comfortable. He'd felt lost since they'd fled the underground; directionless. He opened his bar on the surface if only to regain some sense of control and order. But the war with humanity had left him scarred mentally, and a busy Saturday night with the bar packed full of humans and monsters alike was full of mishaps. Alcohol and species barely recovering from war didn't mix so well; some days it felt like even the smallest accidental brush from a human hand while passing a cold drink over the counter could send Grillby spiralling into a panic attack. He couldn't outright ban humans, that would be enough to start a riot (if not another war), but he didn't have the heart to close the doors for good, either.

More and more often, Grillby thought back to the underground. Things had been calm, and monsters had been such a tight knit community. On the surface there was a lot of space, and most monsters had scattered to more secluded areas and started keeping to themselves in the hopes that their families wouldn't be slaughtered should another human go off the rails. Grillby found himself thinking about the underground more with each passing day. Specifically...the small skeleton that had frequented his bar so often before. The skeleton who had insisted he leave with the others.  
  
\--  
_“You_ have _to go, Grillby.”_

_“Sans, you've never done an honest day's work in your life. You've never even met a human. I fought in the war. If anyone's going to hold the human off, it'll be me.”_

_Sans looked more serious than he ever had before. The bags under his eyes were heavy, and his usual friendly grin was more of a permanent grimace these days. His posture was as slouched as ever, but instead of looking laid back he looked..._

_Dangerous._

_Sans stared him down, unblinking. The two had been fighting about this on and off for hours while Sans helped Alphys coordinate the evacuation of the underground. Grillby wanted to stay and defend his home. Sans told him he had to go._

_“What do you think happens if the humans don't accept them.” Grillby flinched._

_“We can't think about that right now, we have to--”_

_“We have to think about that right now,” Sans spoke with a lot of patience, but he could tell the conversation was beginning to exasperate him. He felt like Sans thought he was speaking to a child. A child he'd explained a very simple concept to many times before. It pissed him off, but Sans continued before he could tell him to shove his suicidal bravery up his ass. “If the humans attack when the others get to the surface, they're gonna need someone who knows what they're doing. Everyone who fought in the war has decided to stay and fight, and if we're only sending untrained monsters up there, who is going to defend them?” Grillby's flames burned a little brighter as he felt his anger spike again. Sans had made an excellent point, and he hated it. Sans' expression softened for the first time since he'd scooped up his brother's dust._

_“You know I'm right. Please, Grillby. Help them. They don't have anyone to watch 'em.”_

_“Come with us.”_

_“Hah,” Sans' grin returned, but it was brittle. “Can't. Me an' the kid have unfinished business.”_

_“He's gone, Sans. Getting in the human's way isn't going to—”_

_“I have to. I wish...” He looked at Grillby with a pained longing that he knew all too well before shaking his head and clearing his throat. “This is how it has to be. Trust me. I'm good at dodging.” He shrugged at Grillby. “Way I figure it, I can keep the kid busy long enough for you, Alphys and the others to get out've here. But if I go with ya I don't think your chances will be nearly as good. I know I don't look or act like much but you'll just have to trust me on this one, kay?”_

_Grillby frowned at the small skeleton for a long moment._

_“Please, Grillby. We're so short on time as it is.”_

_“.....Fine.”_  
\--  
  
It had been years. Grillby figured if the humans on the surface didn't get them the one at their backs would. But there hadn't been any sign of trouble from the mountain for years. At Asgore's instruction, they'd blocked off the entrance of the cave with a few well-placed attacks at some unstable looking rocks, and everyone had assumed the small child wreaking havoc on the underground had died down there. If any monsters had survived, they would have been able to escape the rubble easily. But Mt. Ebott was quiet.

Grillby and Sans' relationship had been....rocky at best. There were a lot of good times, but Sans wanted more than Grillby could offer, and if Grillby was being completely fair he should have known to break off 'whatever it was they were doing' (as Sans would have put it) a long time ago. Still. He'd felt....something. He missed him. He missed the good times.

And Sans had died alone in the dark with a psychopath.

Maybe it was the guilt of leaving, or the stress of trying to make life on the surface work. Whatever it was, it lead Grillby back to the pile of rocks that had once been The Barrior at Mt. Ebott. There was a good chance he was going to die down there, but...

Maybe there was a chance that Sans was still down there, too.

Grillby took a deep, calming breath. And with a bit of effort, he willed his flames through the crevices between the rocks, reforming on the other side of the rock slide. He blinked, his eyes adjusting to the sudden darkness just beyond the light of his own body. He spent a few minutes there, just listening to the eerie stillness of that dark room, waiting for any sign of the human. Nothing.

Finally working up the courage to move forward, Grillby walked into the King's throne room.

_Please, please, please god please be there, please—_

Grillby entered the throne room and instantly had to hang onto the door frame for support. The once peaceful garden was covered in dust.

_Asgore's_ dust.

Fuck.

Grillby did his best to walk around it, but the dust seemed to be everywhere. He felt nauseous as dread filled every fibre of his being with each step towards what Sans had curiously called the 'Judgment Hall'. It was empty, but it was pretty obvious that there had been a fight. Blood and dust was scattered around the room, and the floors and ceilings had taken a lot of damage. Grillby fought through the urge to turn back. He was going to visit his bar no matter what.

Even if the human had killed their king.

A boss monster.

Stronger than any of them.

Maybe...maybe Sans could have hidden, or...

Grillby knew better. The look on Sans' face when they'd left was not the look of someone who was afraid. He was _angry._ He was going to get Justice, no matter what.

There wasn't a sound in all the underground aside from Grillby's solemn footsteps. Everywhere he went was covered with dust; the human hadn't left a single monster alive from what he could tell. By the time he made it to Gerson's, he'd expected to find signs of a battle but—nothing. No dust around his shop, thank god. But no sign of Gerson either. Grillby didn't think the human could take him, but it wasn't like Gerson to wander off from his post. Grillby decided to keep moving.

Eventually he reached Snowdin. It was abandoned and while the buildings were dark, the street lamps were on. The CORE was still operational, so it didn't surprise him, but having seen the previous bustling life of the families that had once lived in town, the quiet stillness was unnerving. Especially at the house of the skeleton brothers. Papyrus used to yell at Sans so loud about his socks and his pet rock that the whole town could hear their comedic carrying on, but now there was just silence.

Silence and dust.

Grillby thought to check and see if Sans was in there, but something distracted him. A light he hadn't expected; a light he hadn't left on.  
Someone was at Grillby's.

He almost started to run for his former bar before common sense kicked in and reminded him that the human was still trapped down here. Everyone had assumed that they'd starve before they could get through the rocks, but there was a chance they hadn't made it through all the food reserves yet. They could live down here for years.

He approached as quietly as he could, careful not to make a sound as his hand fell on the doorknob. He prepared himself to spring into action the second the door opened before he turned the knob and pushed, nudging it open with his foot in case he needed his hands free to defend himself. The door creaked open to reveal a dusty, dishevelled restaurant. There were quite a few empties on the floor and counter, and as he cautiously proceeded forward to look around, he noticed a few empty ketchup bottles around too.

“S.....Sans....?”

There was a moment of absolute silence. Nothing stirred. Then, groggily, from one of the booth's—Sans' favourite, to be precise— “Grillbs?”

The bartender rushed to the source of the noise, throwing the door closed behind him in case the human was near. He found Sans in the booth, surrounded by empty bottles of beer and ketchup. A less experienced monster might have thought those were ketchup stains on Sans' jacket, pants and slippers, but Grillby knew better. He'd fought humans in the past, he knew what happened when you cut them.

“Holy _shit,_ you're _alive—_ And you've made a goddamn _mess_.”

Sans blinked at him for a minute, his alcohol-addled mind desperately trying to distinguish whether he was hallucinating or not. Once he had a moment to process, he let out a hearty laugh.

“Hehhehheh, sorry....Sorry, Grillbs. I figured uh.... you probably wouldn't be using the bar anymore. Y'guys sealed the exits. So I figured that's a pretty good sign yer not coming back for it.” He grinned up at Grillby, but something seemed to click in just then. “Wait. You didn't.... You didn't move the rocks, did you?”

Grillby felt his stomach sink. “No...I simply moved through them.”

“Ah,” Sans nodded after recalling how 'malleable' Grillby's body could be. “Makes sense. S'good.” Grillby's eyebrows knitted together in concern.

“Sans, I'm so sorry, we didn't know you were still down here. We thought... we thought the human must have...” He shook his head. “Let's get out of here, okay?”

Sans seemed to sober up almost instantly. “No.” Grillby's eyes widened in shock.

“No? Aren't you alone down here?”

“You have to leave, Grillby.”

“Sans, I came all this way, you can't just—”

“Damnit Grillby, it's not _safe_ , you have to LEAVE.” Sans leaned forward and slammed his hand on the table, knocking several empty bottles over, his left eye glowing cyan and yellow. Grillby took a step backwards, raising his hands defensively. He'd never seen Sans' eye do _that_.

“Sans,” he spoke gently. “Didn't you kill the human?”

Sans stared at him for a moment before his eye returned to normal and he leaned back. “Heh....heh heh. Hahaha!” Sans was almost doubled over in laughter, his head in his hands. The laughter soon turned to sobs and Grillby, having a very poor track record of comforting people ( _especially_ Sans), watched him devolve into hysterics with no idea how to calm him down. It took a few minutes, but Sans eventually went quiet.

“You have to leave me here, Grillby.” Sans said after an uncomfortable silence had settled in. “For me?” He tried to smile up at the flame monster, but it was strained and sad.

“Where is the human, Sans?” Grillby was more firm this time, and Sans seemed to realize he wasn't going to back down. He sighed.

“The kid is gone, for now.”

“For now? What happened?”

“Asgore was my fault. I just got so tired, I missed them by maybe a second—that's all it took. Poor guy never stood a chance.”

“What? No, you couldn't have known—”

“I knew,” Sans snapped, glaring up at him. “I _knew_ and I thought, that's it, they're gonna grab the souls and destroy _everything_ , but they didn't. They circled back for me. I guess it's personal now, and that's fine by me.”

“But...” Grillby shook his head. Better to leave that alone and get the whole picture first. “Okay, so where did they go?”

Sans laughed, bitter and mirthless. “Same place they always go. They came at me, I killed 'em. They came back. Had another go. Same thing. Repeat over and over till they finally win. Then they destroy all of us.”

Grillby was absolutely lost, now. “What do you mean they come back?”

Sans sighed, his head tilting back until his tired stare was focused on the ceiling. “Look, I can't.... I can't explain this to you again. See, what happened was, we fought a couple years ago and they tried 'mercy'. So I killed the kid while their guard was down. I told them, if we're friends, you won't come back. And they haven't. _Yet_.” He finally turned his gaze on Grillby, and for the first time ever it made Grillby feel cold. “So you have to go, Grillby. And I have to stay. Because when they come back they aren't going to stop until they kill everyone, underground or surface.”

Grillby stared at him, mouth agape as he struggled to process what Sans was trying to say. Sans had been fighting the human all this time? _Years?_ Eventually he latched on to the one thing he knew. “The....the rocks, they can't... they're just a human, they can't move the rocks.”

Sans shook his head. “The rocks don't ever work, Grillby.”

“ _What?_ ”

“The rocks,” Sans spoke gently, patiently, as he finally made his way out of the booth. “They don't ever stop them.” He walked to Grillby, who took another step back. Sans took both his hands and looked up at him. “I miss you... a _lot_ , but... you can't stay here. They're going to kill me. They'll kill you. The rocks are for peace of mind, and to buy some time, but near as I can figure they don't ever last long once I'm gone.” He paused, staring off into the distance. “But then, I guess I'm not usually around to see that part. So I suppose I can't be sure. Call it a hunch.”

“That makes no _sense_! Humans can't come back from the dead, and you're telling me this has happened before? Sans, I—”

Sans straightened, his eyes wide as he looked to the door. “There isn't time.”

“What? Sans, you're _hurting_ me.”

Sans was holding onto Grillby's hands so tightly it was as if he were afraid he might slip away if Sans let go. But he still wasn't looking at him. There was a flash of cyan, and Grillby felt the world tilt and the ground seemed to disappear beneath his feet; suddenly, there was light, and noise seemed to rush in from all sides. Grillby stumbled as Sans let go and it took him a moment to figure out they were in his bar on the surface, in his office. Judging by how much noise there was out in the dining room, it was around five or six at night. Grillby found a garbage can to wretch into. He just barely caught Sans speaking to him.

“I'm so sorry, I wish...I wish there was more time, another way, something...” Sans' voice had begun to shake, and as Grillby wiped his mouth and looked back he could see the strain on Sans' face. “I have to...I have to stop them, okay? I'll see you again before ya know it, heh,” He grinned, tears spilling down his cheeks. “Please don't ever come looking for me again, okay? I have to stay behind.”

“Sans, _wait—_ ”

Another flash of cyan swallowed Sans up, and he was gone.

Grillby stood there, staring at the space where Sans had been just moments before. He wasn't sure how long he'd been standing there when one of his employees leaned into the office.

“Hey boss, you want me to— _whoa,_ you look _terrible_. Everything okay?”

“Out.”

“What?”

“Get _out_.” He walked over to the door and slammed it shut, hearing a muffled ' _yikes, fine_ ' from the other side of the door. He went back to his desk and opened a drawer, pulling out an old bottle of whisky.

Grillby poured himself a drink.

 


End file.
